Dragon's Child
by Pagen Godess
Summary: Stoic should have known from the very beginning that Hiccup was never really his. Third story in my Lonely Youngling Series.


Stoic the Vast should have known from the very beginning that his son didn't really belong with him. Hel, Hiccup barley managed to belong anywhere at all. However it wasn't until a few months after the battle with the Queen that he realized it. It being that Hiccup had never really belonged to him or to anyone. No, his fish bone of a boy belonged to nothing human. And really it surprised him that it had taken so long for him to figure this little fact about his son out.

It had always been painfully odious that Hiccup wasn't suited to be a Viking. And if asked Stoic would admit that he'd been stubborn and hadn't wanted to believe it. While it was true that he understood very little abut his boy, not that he wasn't trying to understand now, he still loved the lad. He was after all one of the greatest gifts that his wife had given to him before her untimely death. But now he wasn't so sure what to think.

Because now that he was thinking about it it was hard for him to deny that Hiccup didn't really belong to him anymore. At least not in the sense that a father owns a son. No his son didn't belong to him but to the dragons that had made their home on Berk after their queen had fallen to his boy and the Night Fury that was his mount. It had taken his seeing the boy surrounded by the beasts and sitting as comfortably as could be to get that single fact through his thick skull.

And it hurt that Hiccup seemed more at ease surrounded by a hoard of beasts than by the tribe that had raised him. But looking back Stoick couldn't help but feel that this might have been something that he could never have stopped. No, it almost seemed as if the gods themselves had a hand in his son's fate. All the clues had been there for him to see. Stoic had just never bothered to put the pieces together before now.

And there were so many pieces and clues. So much evidence that his son wasn't ever going to be a Viking like he and his mother had been. And like all things the clues had started on the very night of his sons birth. That had been the first time that the Night Fury had appeared during a raid. The beast had circled the village the entire time that they had been fighting. It hadn't killed anyone at least not then.

No the first time it had killed had been the first time that Hiccup had gotten out of the house while the dragons had been after their sheep. He couldn't remember the mane of the man who had been killed by the tower that the night fury had brought down with one of its deadly fire balls. All he could remember was seeing his two year old son sitting not ten feet away from the burning wood and thinking that had the dragon not fired the shot when it had then his son would have died.

And as Hiccup grew and started roaming more there were only more incidences. But never had his son been severely hurt by any of the attacking dragons. There had been scrapes and bruises from falling and running into others but never so much as a smudge of ash from a dragon touched him. In fact it seemed like the dragons tended to herd his son from one place to another. The boy had been chased around the village so often that it was almost unusual to not see him out during a raid. But still there was the Night Fury.

Stoic could count the times that the Night Fury hadn't appeared during raids on his hands. And that was only because the number of times that Hiccup had stayed inside had been so small. He had never realized before now that if Hiccup was about during a raid then the Night Fury was about as well. Now that he cared to look at it it almost seemed like the dragon had been waiting for the chance to get himself caught.

That was madness of course because even dumb beasts had a sense of survival. Animals fled when hunted and the Fury should have been no different. But it had been. The night fury had taken care of his son when no one else would do it. Hiccup had thrived under the teachings of a dragon in ways that he'd never thrived when taught by anyone else. Hiccup thrived among the dragons in ways that he never had among his own tribe.

Stoic saw the way the dragons looked at his son. Saw the way that they nudged at his son when they felt he needed to rest. He'd seen Snotlout's Nightmare growl at her rider when he'd gotten to rough with his cousin. There would be no harm done to his son while any of the dragons of Berk were near. His son had constant protectors in the scaly beasts. It wasn't just when it came to Hiccup's safety that the dragons seemed to be concerned with either.

He'd seen Toothless refuse to eat his food until Hiccup had started eating and if the Night Fury had something to eat and his son didn't then the black dragon seemed more than happy to share some of his food. Not that Hiccup was too eager to eat what his mount had offered. Stoic wasn't sure how his son could stomach regurgitated fish without puking his guts out. It was a skill that no other managed to master. Not that being able to hold down regurgitated fish was much of a skill to begin with.

Some part of Stoic didn't quite understand why all the dragons were so taken with his boy. While it was true that he'd helped kill their queen that still didn't seem to be good enough. Hiccups way with the dragons couldn't seem to be duplicated no matter how hard anyone tried. And that was probably because no one seemed to be able to understand them the way Hiccup did. And so many were trying and failing. Hiccup was the Dragon Master. Hiccup could do things with the dragons of Berk that no other could.

Things that most of them would never dare to try even when surrounded by a haze of drunken stupidity. Stoic had never been so proud of his son. He'd also never been so worried. No, matter how hard he tried he just couldn't understand what it was about his son that made the dragons act the way they did. There wasn't really a reason for it at all. At least no reason that he could see and there were times when he wasn't sure if he was looking hard enough. Or maybe he was looking too hard. He didn't know which it was. It was hard trying to figure out the mystery that was his son and the bigger mystery that was the dragons that surrounded the boy.

He'd spent fifteen years trying to force Hiccup into becoming the Viking that Stoic felt he should be. He'd spent fifteen years failing. The only good that had come out of his attempts had been Hiccup's apprenticeship ship to Gobber in the forge and it had taken a long time for his son to get good at that. But the dragons. Hiccup had taken to the dragons so quickly that it was almost as if he were one of them. The truth struck Stoick like a bell being struck. His realization seemed to leave him shaken and his ears ringing.

Hiccup and the dragons were the way they were because the dragons treated his son like he was one of their own. The dragons treated Hiccup as if he weren't human at all. They played and coddled and protected. It was almost like watching one of the scaly beasts take care of one of their own young. The dragons acted as if Hiccup was one of their own chicks instead of treating him like the human being that he really and truly was. Hiccup had such a way with them because of the way the dragons viewed him.

The Night Fury acted almost as if he were a parent watching out for his babe because he was. And it hurt. It hurt a lot to realize that when Hiccup had failed to find what he needed with his tribe that he had found it instead with a dragon. When his son had been denied acceptance among his own people he had turned to the dragons for it instead. And he had found it there. Stoic swallowed as he watched Toothless curl up around his son. Not that the man felt he much of a right to call Hiccup that anymore. Hiccup hadn't truly been his child for months now. Hiccup didn't belong to him or even to the tribe anymore. His son belonged to the dragons. He was their child and they treated him as such.

But looking at everything that was laid before him now Stoic had to wonder if Hiccup had truly ever belong to him at all.

oooooo

Hey look here's another one. This is the third part of my Lonely Youngling Series. I'm sure that I confused you. Though I might not have. I always assume that I confuse when I write like this. I think that i may do one more fic for this series. I'm not sure yet though I'm tempted to do a small story about one of the parts I stuck in this. I'm not too sure about that though either. Eh, I'll worry about it come December.

I hope you enjoyed this and please feel free to drop me a review. I like having things to look at when I check my e-mail other than junk mail.


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